Skip to main content

US lagging on CBDCs could spell ‘trouble’ — Crypto Council policy head

Fanusie doesn’t believe the Chinese-led CBDC movement on the global stage will replace the U.S. dollar, but it may cause a series of geopolitical headaches.

A cryptocurrency researcher and former CIA analyst believes the United States government’s relatively slow start on Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) development may result in it losing grip on controlling the global financial system.

Yaya Fanusie, the policy head at the crypto advocacy group the Crypto Council for Innovation explained in a Feb. 28 Bloomberg interview that sanctioned states are looking to transact on financial infrastructure that isn’t controlled or heavily influenced by the U.S. in order to move funds more freely cross-borders.

If the U.S. continues to sit on the “sidelines” and lag behind on CBDC adoption, Fanusie believes this may spell “trouble” and cause unforeseen “geopolitical implications” over time:

Fanusie explained that state-issued CBDCs could be a part of this financial infrastructure that becomes globally adopted, and that if the U.S. has little influence over these new standards, then this “impacts U.S state economic statecraft.”

“The potency of our sanctions power comes from the centrality of the U.S. to the financial global infrastructure. So if that shifts a little bit, it doesn't mean that China is going to take over or that the yuan is going to displace the dollar but if there's a viable new rail where sanctioned actors can now transact, that’s trouble.”

The U.S. Federal Reserve has however recently made progress on its CBDC — the Digital Dollar Project — having released the latest version of its whitepaper on Jan. 18:

However, the Federal Reserve has not received approval from the U.S. government to proceed with the CBDC project.

Fanusie highlighted that China has benefited from a near-first mover advantage, having explored CBDCs since 2014 and launching the pilot version of its digital yuan (e-CNY) on Jan. 4, 2022, which Fanusie says has processed “millions of transactions” across “millions of wallets” so far.

Fanusie added that there is an “array of pilots” testing out smart contracts to add programmability into the CBDC and that China helping other countries adopt similar standards.

He added there is possibly an unspoken “race” going on in the CBDC frontier as nations look to gain a geopolitical edge.

“That's happening whether we want to like it or not.”

However previous commentators on the CBDC race between China and the U.S. have said that China’s CBDC ambition is purely about domestic dominance rather than trying to beat the U.S. dollar.

Related: What are CBDCs? A beginner's guide to central bank digital currencies

CBDCs run on state-controlled ledgers, which are reported to be more efficient and easier to use in some cases than decentralized public networks, such as Bitcoin and Ethereum.

However, some opponents of CBDCs believe states are adopting blockchain-powered CBDCs to maintain a degree of financial control over their citizens.

Part of the pushback in the U.S. recently came from pro-crypto U.S. Congressman Tom Emmer, who recently introduced the CBDC Anti-Surveillance State Act in an effort to protect the financial privacy of U.S. citizens from actions by the Federal Reserve:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ripple Analysts Predict XRP Surge to $0.66 as Volume Skyrockets

Image
With Ripple celebrating a year anniversary of a critical ruling in its ongoing legal battle with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), analysts predict XRP to surge to $0.66 as the tokens’ volume skyrockets. Moreover, investment interest has also surged, only strengthening the forecasts. XRP has surged above the $0.52 level following a 25% increase over the last seven days, according to CoinMarketCap. Additionally, the crypto has seen transactions increase to as much as $2.55 million, despite reversing to its current $1.6 million level. Still, there is reason to be optimistic for the token’s performance. Source – CryptoTicker Also Read: Ripple: Will XRP Skyrocket to $3.81 By 2030? XRP Could Continue Surging Far Above $0.6 Level, Analyst Says In a post to X (formerly Twitter), crypto analyst Dark Defender predicted that Ripple (XRP) could surge to the $0.66 level as its volume skyrockets. Indeed, the analyst noted that the crypto broke resistance at the $0.46 level. Moreover,
Read more

Cardano: ADA To Pump At $10, Analyst Predicts

Image
Cardano, one of the domain’s notable crypto tokens, is yet to experience the bullish onset of the market that its contemporaries are currently basking in. Moreover, the token has long been trading between $0.40 and $0.47, drawing significant speculation on when its price will skyrocket. The ADA ecosystem is looking forward to the Chang Hard Fork update, which is poised to introduce noteworthy changes in Cardano’s infrastructure and order. With the hard fork timeline drawing in hard and fast, several crypto analysts are also busy predicting new price thresholds for ADA and speculating on Cardano’s future price levels.  Also Read: Analyst Predicts Timeline For Cardano’s ( ADA ) Bullish Price Breakout Chang Hard Fork Could Help ADA Surge To $10 Source: Reddit Cardano’s slow price pace has been a serious topic of contention within the crypto community. With the Chang Hard Fork upgrade in the mix, several analysts are banking on ADA ’s meteoric price rise post-fork deployment,
Read more

Setup for High-Quality Altcoins Looking Increasingly Favorable As Global Liquidity Gears Up for Expansion: Jamie Coutts

Image
Real Vision analyst Jamie Coutts thinks high-quality altcoins could be primed for price surges as global liquidity ramps up. Coutts tells his 18,600 followers on the social media platform X that the market looks close to washed out, global liquidity is about to turn higher and the risk/reward picture looks “increasingly favorable” for high-quality altcoins. “Top 200 Equal Weight vs. market cap weight ratio at extreme bearish levels. Currently, it’s -2.8 standard deviations ~ a bearish extreme that only hit on three previous occasions. • 2021: During a bull market that proved to be an excellent re-up for the cycle. • 2022: prematurely, but close to the cycle lows when the market was 70% down. • 2023: Near the SEC-catalyzed capitulation lows, Alts decisively broke higher four months later. Despite a small sample size, this breadth measure hints at upcoming cyclical bottoms and mid-cycle entries. Current data parallels 2021’s mid-cycle slump, not 2022/23’s end.”
Read more